
The Reverend Kathleen Killian Proper 10B/24
Ephesians 1:3-14
Mark 6:14-29
July 14 2024
Memories
On this day of the Resurrection and joyful Sunday morning, our gospel is anything but; it is sobering, dark, and a seemingly unredeemed text; gloomy news sandwiched between the great good news of Jesus' commissioning of the twelve disciples and their successful return.
So why does Mark tell this story that is the longest passage in the gospels in which Jesus is not the subject and never makes an appearance?
To set the stage, Jesus had only recently returned to his hometown, his disciples in tow, first to be met with wonder and acclaim but then derision and doubt. Not to be deterred, Jesus shakes off the dust from his sandals and moves on, continuing to teach and heal throughout the countryside. Then he sends out the twelve disciples to do the same, and they do so with considerable success. Everyone was talking about this small band of followers and wondering about their leader—this miracle worker and teacher of wisdom —who was he? King Herod knew, or at least he thought he knew that Jesus was was John the Baptist come back to life after being beheaded at Herod’s own order. Our gospel is a flashback of King Herod’s, and his memory of the events that had unfolded at his lavish birthday celebration.
Everyone who was anyone had been there when Herod’s step-daughter danced for the crowd, so beguiling Herod and the whole party, that the king made a rash and public promise to her: I will give you what ever you ask, even half of my kingdom. The young girl asked her mother, Herod’s wife and queen, who immediately replied: the Baptist’s head on a platter.
Queen Herodias wanted the baptizer dead; John was a prophet who held great sway with the people and thus threatened Herod’s power and her own control; moreover, John had disputed the legitimacy of their marriage as Herod was married to his brother’s wife, his brother still very much alive, which in accordance with Mosaic law was both illegal and immoral. This is why the Baptist was first arrested and imprisoned. And then everything happened so fast: the dancing—the promise—the asking—and the beheading of John.
The writings of first-century historian Josephus confirm that Herod imprisoned John the Baptist and ordered his death, which only magnifies this haunting scripture, a long-ago memory that we are confronted with. As Christians, we have inherited a vast of array of ancestral memories from generations past, including John’s imprisonment and execution. What are we to do with all of these memories? What are we being called to remember? The prophet himself, and his gruesome death? The risk and cost of prophecy and discipleship? An ambitious but weak ruler and his vindictive wife?
The great theologian and philosopher St. Augustine understood memory to be a measureless capacity through which we come to know God. He posits that memory itself retains an impression of its original existence in the divine mind, and of the true happiness that is found only in God. Perhaps this is why so much of what the Bible insists upon is indeed that we remember—recollect and cast our minds back—to how it was at the very beginning in the Garden. God wants us to know true happiness, and thus calls his people to remember by creating the rainbow as a reminder of the covenant between God’s self and every living creature (Genesis 9:16-17). Throughout the Old Testament, we are cautioned to take care to remember our Creator and the former things of old (Ecclesiastes 12:1), lest we forget the Lord (Deut 6:12). The psalmist sings: I remember your name in the night, O Lord (Psalm 119:55), and meditate on all that you have done (Psalm 143:5). The Israelites are exhorted over and over not to forget their sins, as that which is forgotten cannot be forgiven and redeemed, but to “stir their memories” and remember the story of their Exodus from Egypt.
We might think of memory as primarily an individual, mental, or utilitarian activity. But in the life of faith, remembrance is a means of generational participation, not only with the past and tradition, but with the remembering forth of God’s future and hope. We cannot separate our faith, let alone ourselves, from our memories; whether they are conscious or buried, personal, collective or ancestral, memory shapes who we are. What we remember, and how we remember it, influences our present day lives a great deal, often more so than the actual event itself. Memories can also heal and be healed over time. And though we may lose our memory and forget, we are never forgotten by God. God’s remembrance of us is lived out every time we gather in worship and prayer.
In the great thanksgiving of every mass the awesome work of God in salvation history is recounted; and in every communion, we quite literally re-member the body and blood of Christ in our own body and blood, re-figured in our own world and time: Take, eat, this is my body and the blood; Do this in remembrance of me. Jesus gave himself to us, that we might remember who we are—beloved children of God and children of the Light; that we remember our unity with him and the Father.
When Mark sandwiches Herod’s memory of the beheading of John between
the commission and return of Jesus’ disciples, he gives his audience a kind of binocular lens or vision with which to integrate memories that might appear unrelated. The story of John and Herod marks the expansion of Jesus’ mission, and the end of its innocence by foreshadowing Jesus’ own death. John's hurried and unsanctioned death is a precursor to Jesus' own perfunctory trial and death. Though both Herod and Pilate looked somewhat favorably upon their captives, both rulers acted against their better judgement—as I would imagine all of us have done—and both condemned the innocent to death—as we also have done in beheading our own “innocence” with the weapons of judgment, hubris, and indifference.
In the mirror of the story, will we recognize the disastrous consequences of choosing not to remember our humanity, of the willful forgetting that we are not God? Will we confess our own self-interest and the lies we tell and believe? The Baptist was executed not because of his faith, but because he spoke truth; and though beheaded, John still speaks; still preaches the truth no matter the cost. John’s prophetic ministry ultimately found its fullest expression in Jesus, the one who is the truth.
In his letter to the Ephesians, St. Paul wrote: we are marked with the seal of the promised Holy Spirit; this is the pledge of our inheritance toward redemption as God's own people. This means that as Christians we are called to a life of continual awakening through the memories of our salvation, and by the remembering forth of God’s promise and pledge of redemption. Ignoring this call may be more costly than answering it. No matter where you are in the mission of your life, remember that at its heart is the love of God, always. God’s love and faithfulness must never be forgotten, especially when times are dark; God’s love and faithfulness in Christ is ever to be remembered as the living and sustaining force that it was, and is, and is to come.